Signs of the Times...
This blog is loaded with the latest signs of our times from our evil and unfaithful generation.
The madness from the modern world....
North Pole warmer than Southern California
(NEWSER) – It's been a bizarre winter, and Wednesday might just bring the weirdest moment yet: It could be as warm as 40 degrees at the North Pole. That, as Discovery explains, is a good 50 degrees warmer than usual, and means that a place now engulfed in darkness 24 hours a day could be warmer than Southern California. "That's absolutely terrifying and incredibly rare," writes meteorologist Eric Holthaus at Slate. Centered over Iceland, the storm that's responsible — the same system that brought December tornadoes to Texas — could end up being one of the top five storms ever recorded in that North Atlantic region, writes Andrew Freedman at Mashable. It will be a "meteorological marvel," he writes. "In a region famous for ship-sinking waves and relentless blizzards, this storm may stand out for its sheer intensity." Expect 230mph winds "roaring across the North Atlantic at aircraft cruising altitudes," and lots more rain for an already soaked UK.
And though this is a strong El Nino year, that's probably not the cause here, writes Holthaus, noting that El Nino generally has little influence on Europe. "This, more than any other extreme weather event in a remarkable year for the climate, feels like something new." Climate blogger Robert Scribbler gets into the specifics of the "daisy chain" that's at play involving two other low-pressure systems in the North Atlantic, and he adds that it "reeks of a human-forced warming of the Earth’s climate." Holthaus, too, is worried about the same, writing that storms like this one will go a long way toward making dire predictions of an ice-free Arctic within decades come true. But the Washington Post notes that some climate scientists are skeptical that global warming is playing a role in storms like these.
Read the original article at Newser
DAYS OF LOT – Transgender man in Ecuador makes history with pregnancy
(Yahoo News) A couple in Ecuador is making history with a unique pregnancy: The father-to-be is carrying the baby of his transgender partner. Fernando Machado and Diane Rodriguez announced their pregnancy, believed to be the first of its kind in South America, on social media earlier this month and it’s received widespread attention in a continent that has seen a sudden explosion in the rights and visibility of trans people.
Rodriguez, who was born Luis, is one of Ecuador’s most-prominent LGBT activists and says she and her Venezuelan-born partner, whose birth name was Maria, decided to publicize the pregnancy to help change attitudes in the staunchly Roman Catholic society. Although both take hormones, neither has undergone gender-reassignment surgery, so the child-to-be was conceived the old-fashioned way with no known medical complications to date. “We’re trying to break the myths about transsexuality,” Rodriguez told The Associated Press. FULL REPORT
PLAYING WITH FIRE – Oklahoma City Officials Permit Satanist to Desecrate Virgin Mary Statue
Oklahoma City officials have granted a permit to a Satanist to desecrate a statue of the Virgin Mary in front of a Catholic Church on Christmas Eve, a decision that is outraging Christians who say the city’s mayor would have never allowed a similar permit to be issued in protest of a mosque.
Adam Daniels, a member of the Satanist church, says he will pour fake blood over the statue and say prayers to it in an effort to dispel the notion of the virgin birth, a core doctrine not only of the Catholic Church but millions of Christians the world over.
He said he plans to pour costume blood that has been ‘treated with sulfur powder and ash” on a statue he will bring himself, reported the Fatima Center, a Catholic website at Fatima.org.
“The outrage is scheduled to take place outside St. Joseph’s Old Cathedral on December 24 from 4:30 to 6:15 p.m.,” the website reported, referring to the event as an “atrocity.”
The Oklahoman, a daily newspaper in Oklahoma City, also reported on the upcoming event.
WND spoke with a resident of Oklahoma who said she read an article in the Oklahoman a couple of weeks ago but thought nothing of it because it was vague and mentioned no details about the man behind the event.
“I did read about it in the paper. It just said they were going to protest, nothing about his past or his motives,” said Sharon Gricol of McCloud, which is about 20 miles east of Oklahoma City. “This is hard to believe.”
Gricol said she wondered if Oklahoma City would issue a similar permit for someone to desecrate an image of Muhammad in front of a mosque.
“I’m also wondering, why is this not a hate crime against Christians?” she asked.
“It is still wrong when the whole country knows this permit if given to desecrate Muhammad or the Quran next to a mosque would have national media attention,” Gricol told WND, “and the president and his attorney general (Loretta Lynch) taking legal actions.”
After the jihadist attack on San Bernardino, Lynch said she would not hesitate to prosecute any American for hate speech that incited violence against Muslims.
“The Oklahoman described the upcoming event as if it were nothing more than a small political rally or artist’s display,” Fatima.org reported.
“The protest will be confined to the sidewalk and will not block any church entrances, according to the permit obtained by Daniels. The permit also requires to clean up the display after the event to ensure no costume blood is left on the sidewalk.”
The Fatima Center added: “Welcome to 2015 USA, where government allows all the public blasphemy you care to provoke, provided you do it within the limits of your city-issued permit.”
Daniels told the Oklahoman that the virgin birth of Jesus is a fraud.
Daniels calls his event the “Virgin Birth is a Lie,” which he described as “exposing the lies” of the Catholic Church. The purpose of the blood, he said, is to “add another layer of corruption to Mary, which is an emblem of the Catholic Church.”
Daniels is a convicted sex-offender and had built an “altar to Satan” using rubble from the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing in which 168 Americans lost their lives.
He used this rubble, he said, because it would have been “one of the most highly negative charges you could have … energy-wise.”
Fatima Center reports Daniels is protesting the Catholic Church on Christmas Eve because the archdiocese of Oklahoma City’s recent demonstrations against the group’s “black mass,” the unveiling of a Bahoment [satanic] statue, and Daniel’s own book-signing event.
“In a sense, we could ignore this pathetic creature as one merely seeking to aggrandize himself,” Fatima.org reported. “But as Our Lord told the 19th Century Sister Marie de Saint Pierre of France in messages approved by the Church, public desecration requires public reparation.”
The protest could result in a confrontation.
A group of concerned Catholics will attempt to occupy the area where the violation is slated to occur. They will also pray the Rosary in reparation, according to Fatima.org.
The Fatima Center said it urges those who cannot be present in Oklahoma City to “offer acts of reparation for this desecration, which is a pointed attack against Catholicism and Our Lady Herself.”
“You could pray an extra Rosary, make some extra sacrifices, offer prayers of reparation, make a Holy Hour in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament while the Oklahoma outrages is taking place, or make a Holy Hour at some other day or time that is more convenient. You can make reparation after the event as well.The website asked its readers to “count yourselves among the friends of Our Lady who, as She told Sister Lucia in 1929, have compassion on Our Lady’s Heart “circled with thorns,” and “make an act of reparation to remove them.”
Whatever you do, know well that Our Lady expects you to do something. You could also register your complaint with Mayor Mick Cornett, under whose administration this outrage is permitted.”
Oklahoma City Mayor Mick Cornett did not immediately return a phone call from WND seeking comment Thursday.
Read more at http://www.wnd.com/2015/12/city-oks-satanists-blood-spill-on-virgin-mary/#K4EVk6OZVSWufTvM.99
"Christmas Is Dead" Hyperinflated Venezuelans Face Holiday Without Lights, Food, & Hope
The government’s take on Christmas celebrations has been significantly more muted this year than in 2014. As Breitbart reports,
Last year, Maduro debuted a “socialist Barbie” that almost bankrupted stores forced to sell it after the government forced the price down to a tenth of its value.Maduro has been significantly less prominent in holiday celebrations this year following the overwhelming defeat of the Venezuelan United Socialist Party (PSUV) in the December 6 legislative elections.
Barbie was the latest in a series of goods – eggs, milk, flour, vegetable oil – to suffer a similar fate. Fixed price controls forced the government to issue ration cards for basic goods in 2014. That year, Maduro also used his time on television to condemn the anti-socialist opposition for being “grinches” trying to “steal Christmas” from the people by condemning said price controls and demanding an end to the violent oppression of dissidents.
In 2013, Maduro’s first year in office, the government released a Christmas carol praising Maduro titled “Knock Knock– Who Is It? People Of Peace, Lower Those Prices, Nicolás Is Here.”
“This year, Christmas is dead, there is not enough money,” Elise Belisario, a resident of the Caracas suburb Petare, tells Agence France-Presse (AFP). She notes there is no Christmas decor anywhere and people do not have enough money to buy presents. Some cannot even afford the basic goods needed to put together a traditional feast of roast pork and assorted sides.* * *
The website El Colombiano estimates that a full Christmas dinner costs between 2,000 and 3,000 bolívares, which is the equivalent of about one third of a monthly minimum wage. Individual basic food items can rack that price up significantly if especially scarce in any particularly neighborhood. For example, a woman selling eggs on the black market in Caracas tells AFP a box of 30 eggs costs 1,300 bolívars alone.
It is difficult to estimate how much these prices would translate to in dollars because the government insists on setting the value of its currency at a fixed rate most believe is intended to mask the nation’s hyperinflation problem, and is significantly higher than the real value of the bolívar on the black market. The Venezuelan website Dolar Today, which tracks the price of the bolívar on the black market, claims one American dollar is worth 841 bolívars today. This would make Venezuela’s minimum wage about $11 a month.
In addition to food items, non-necessary goods have seen a massive spike in prices. El Colombiano estimates the price of a Christmas tree to be up to 33,000 bolívars. A toy doll costs around 15,000 bolívars. “You either eat or you dress your children,” Lucía González, a vendor in Caracas, tells the publication.
Socialist utopia... where everyone is equally pissed off...
In Sweden, a Cash-Free Future Nears
STOCKHOLM — Parishioners text tithes to their churches. Homeless street vendors carry mobile credit-card readers. Even the Abba
Museum, despite being a shrine to the 1970s pop group that wrote
“Money, Money, Money,” considers cash so last-century that it does not
accept bills and coins.
Few places are tilting toward a cashless future as quickly as Sweden, which has become hooked on the convenience of paying by app and plastic.
This
tech-forward country, home to the music streaming service Spotify and
the maker of the Candy Crush mobile games, has been lured by the
innovations that make digital payments easier. It is also a practical
matter, as many of the country’s banks no longer accept or dispense
cash.
At the Abba
Museum, “we don’t want to be behind the times by taking cash while cash
is dying out,” said Bjorn Ulvaeus, a former Abba member who has
leveraged the band’s legacy into a sprawling business empire, including
the museum.
Not
everyone is cheering. Sweden’s embrace of electronic payments has
alarmed consumer organizations and critics who warn of a rising threat
to privacy and increased vulnerability to sophisticated Internet crimes.
Last year, the number of electronic fraud cases surged to 140,000, more
than double the amount a decade ago, according to Sweden’s Ministry of
Justice.
'We Won't Make Frankensteins,'...Yet... Cloning Giant Boyalife's CEO Says
BEIJING — The head of a Chinese firm that is building the world's biggest animal cloning factory has vowed not to use the technology on people — for now, at least.
Biotech company Boyalife Group's $30 million facility in the coastal city of Tianjin will produce embryos of cattle as well as racehorses and contraband-sniffing dogs when it becomes operational next year.
"No, we don't do human cloning, we won't make Frankensteins," said Dr. Xu Xiaochun, its chief executive. "The technology we have is very advanced ... [but if uncontrolled] technology can also do damage ... Every technology has to have a boundary."
As a 12-year-old, Xu became fascinated with plant cloning. Now aged 44, he is leading China's charge to become a world leader in cloning technology.
"Our primary focus is prime quality beef," Xu told NBC News in an exclusive interview, noting that China's cattle industry hasn't traditionally focused on meat production.
However, beef consumption is currently growing at double-digit rates in the country, with imports increasing due to the low quality of China's domestic beef.
The Tianjin plant will initially produce a 100,000 embryos of prime beef cattle per year. That figure is eventually expected to rise to 1 million embryos annually, which will make it the planet's largest animal-cloning operation.
The bomb-sniffing dogs have become "a major force in anti-terrorism campaigns," Xu said, with about 600 cloned dogs working globally.
http://www.nbcnews.com/news/china/we-won-t-make-frankensteins-cloning-giant-boyalife-s-ceo-n480891
Feminists From the UN Visit U.S. and Complain We Don’t Do Enough to Promote Abortion
We at C-Fam have never taken the position that the UN ought to be closed or that the UN ought to move out of New York City. We believe there is a role for this body, mostly in airing out issues in the General Assembly.
But, we do take the position that radical feminist busybodies aught to stay out of not only the United States but every other country, too. Three leftist lawyers representing the UN just visited the United States for a ten day tour during which they met only with fellow leftists, only those who support the killing of unborn children.Their report is replete with misunderstandings about U.S. law and U.S. politics. Worse than that, it is replete with deliberate lies about what international law requires.
One of the more comical statements in their report is that the U.S. ought to pass the Equal Rights Amendment. You read that and you just have to laugh. The Equal Rights Amendment is just about the deadest public policy idea in the United States. It was defeated a few decades ago and never resurrected.
These three radical feminists also bemoan that the U.S. has never ratified the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women. They say the U.S. promised to ratify it! If only Barack Obama was a dictator that may be possible. As it is, passing CEDAW is not even remotely possible.
C-Fam and other like-minded groups have spent the better part of two decades explaining to the Congress and the American people how various UN treaties are dangerous to our people and our system of government. Moreover, we have spent almost twenty years exposing how UN treaty monitoring bodies are out of control, most especially the CEDAW Committee.
So successful have we been in exposing these dangerous treaties, that the U.S. Senate refused three times to ratify the treaty that ought to be the lowest hanging fruit, the treaty on persons with disabilities. It has been repeatedly defeated over the question of importing abortion into the treaty and also how crazy the treaty monitoring body will inevitably be.
The ladies were especially upset with pro-life protestors in front of an abortion clinic. They say the protestors were kinds of terrorists. What nonsense. If these ladies want to curtail free speech, they ought to do it elsewhere and not here where speech is protected by the world’s oldest Constitution.
They were also upset with the Republican candidates for President for supposedly saying things about women that were stereotypical and also warring on women.
These radical law professors had special praise for the pro-abortion group called Emily’s List for their efforts in getting women involved in politics and running for office. Did they even think about praising the Susan B. Anthony List, a pro-life group that does the same thing? Not on your life.
And that gets to the heart of the matter. Not a single UN treaty says abortion is a human right. Not one. But, these quite dishonest women insist that international law requires abortion on demand. They come to our countries and proceed to lie about them. This is simply outrageous.
Ladies, you are not welcome here. Go home. Never come back.
The vaccine industry wants a national registry of vaccine compliance, but what we really need is national tracking of vaccine FAILURES and outbreaks
The concept of health freedom, or medical choice, seems to disintegrate a little bit more each day in the U.S., as more and more states continue to eliminate vaccine exemptions, with California being the latest example. As vaccine exemption laws wither away, state immunization registries for both adults and children are on the rise.
Today, there are 29 states that have “fully functioning inoculation databases,” says VaccineInfo.net. Their existence is a result of a push made in 1993 by Hillary Clinton (who was first lady at the time), for a “federally-funded inoculation database” that was a component of the Comprehensive Child Immunization Act. While the plan was shot down, six months later, federal officials “covertly attached” a bill allowing the implementation of state vaccination databases, paid for with $400 million in federal money.(1)
State vaccine registries were approved under the 1996 healthcare bill, the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), which authorized the Social Security Administration to release all newborns’ Social Security Numbers to individual states for the purpose of creating state immunization registries.
Vaccine databases allow daycares, schools, doctors and even health insurance companies to discriminate against those who choose not to vaccinate
Tracking vaccine information for adults and children creates cause for concern for several reasons, including privacy violations, unnecessary data mining and discrimination by daycares, schools, physicians, hospitals and health insurance companies.
In states where vaccine exemptions have been eliminated, like California, registries can also be used to take children away from parents unwilling to vaccinate their offspring due to potential adverse health effects or religious beliefs.
Agneta Breitenstein, director of the Health Law Institute in Boston said the following about state databases:
There are three things that are always true when registries are created: One, there will always be more information collected than is needed to complete the task; two, it will always be kept longer than we are told; and, three, it will always be used for purposes other than intended.
Vaccine Info reports:
With the establishment of the state databases, the health care establishment has a perfect framework to implement a federal “immunization registry”, and they are determined to do such. This is being accomplished through the Center for Disease Control’s National Immunization Registry Clearinghouse. The intent of this registry effort is to integrate all of the state databases into one central (i.e. federal) tracking system controlled by the CDC and HHS.
This new system will track every child using information gathered from both public and private health systems. As one CDC publication recently stated: “CDC supports the ultimate goal of enrollment of all U.S. preschool children in a state or community immunization registry.
Barbara Loe Fisher, president of the National Vaccine Information Center told the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention committee during testimony:
[W]hen they [the public] are informed of your plan, understand all too well that state vaccine tracking registries being promoted to the media and Congress in the name of protecting the public health are simply a smokescreen for the creation of a government-operated system that will further invade their privacy and take away already endangered liberties. They don’t want government, drug companies and insurance company employees or the local school nurse to monitor their movements from state to state and be privy to their health records and the most personal details of their lives. They want that information to remain a private matter between them and their personal physician, as it has always been until now.
What we really need is better tracking of vaccine INJURIES
Currently, the public has very few resources when it comes to finding information regarding the health impacts of vaccines. Vaccine side-effects are far more common than the average person might think. Individuals or the family of individuals injured by vaccines have been paid out nearly $3 billion in claims since the National Childhood Vaccine Injury Act was founded in 1986 – with the flu shot causing the most harm.(2)
The only vaccine injury reporting system in existence is the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS), co-sponsored by the CDC, which collects data regarding adverse effects of vaccines. “VAERS provides a nationwide mechanism by which adverse events following immunization may be reported, analyzed, and made available to the public.”(3)
Sources:
(1) VaccineInfo.net
(2) NVIC.org
(3) VAERS.HHS.gov/index
Transgender Fad Rapidly Spreading In Primary Schools, ‘Clusters’ Emerging As Children Copy Friends
(Breitbart) The number of primary school-aged children, some as young as four, beginning to “transition” their gender is rising rapidly in the UK. The popularity of the fad appears to be clustered, with children copying others in the same schools. Up to 80 primary school-aged children a year are now seeking help towards potentially changing their gender, the chair of Mermaids, a charity which lobbies for families who believe their children and teenagers are transgendered, has revealed.
Speaking to the Telegraph, Susie Green said that, in some cases, British children as young as four are already in the process of “transitioning” to another sex. She also described how her organisation has observed a cluster effect across the country, with children following one and another in the same school; a school where there might be a teacher who promotes transgender ideology.
Her anecdotal evidence correlates with the results of a study by Mark Zucker at the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health in Toronto, Canada, which found that transgenderism was more prominent and persistent among children when promoted by adults. FULL REPORT
Sweden's First Month Of 'Islamic Multiculturalism' - Rapes, Acquittals, & Severed Heads
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Some 30 Muslim men thought that the woman was in violation of Islamic sharia law, by being in Sweden unaccompanied by a man. They thought that she should therefore be raped and her teenage son killed.
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Sometime during the night, the victim was awakened by the Iraqi as he
raped her. The woman managed to break free and locate a train
attendant. At first, the woman did not want to call the police. "She felt sorry for him [the rapist] ... and was afraid he would be deported back to Iraq."
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Two Swedish citizens were convicted by a Gothenburg Court of joining
an Islamist terror group in Syria and murdering two captives. Video evidence showed one victim being beheaded. "Every night when I have gone to bed, I have seen a head hanging in the air." - Court Chairman Ralf G. Larsson.
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One week after Sweden raised its terror alert level to the highest ever, the police raised another alarm -- saying their weapons are simply not good enough to prevent a potential terror attack.
November 4: Bobel Barqasho, a 31-year-old Syrian, was sentenced by Sweden's Supreme Court to 14 years in prison. Before his case reached the Supreme Court, Barqasho had been sentenced by a lower court to 9 years in prison, then acquitted by the Court of Appeals. In February 2013, Barqasho threw his wife off a sixth-floor balcony. Against all odds, the woman survived the 13-meter (about 43 feet) fall, but was badly injured. When she woke up after five weeks in a coma, her head was held together by a helmet, her face felt loose, and her teeth were gone. In the Court of Appeals, the defense managed to plant reasonable doubt about the man's guilt by claiming the woman was depressed and had jumped of her own free will] so the Court of Appeals set him free. By the time the Supreme Court pronounced its sentence of 14 years, Barqasho had disappeared. He is now being sought by Interpol.
November 6: The Grönkulla School in Alvesta closed after reports of a rape at the facility spread on social media. A Somali boy had apparently been sexually harassing a 12-year-old girl for some time. On October 17, he allegedly took his attentions a step farther, pulled the girl behind a bush and raped her. The girl's father had been unsuccessful in trying to get the school to address the problem earlier, but even after the reported rape, the school's management did not act. The boy was allowed to continue going to the school – just on a schedule different from the girl's. Her distraught parents told the news website Fria Tider: "We are being spat on because we are Swedish." In protest against the school's management, many parents, viewing the school as having sided with the perpetrator, moved their children to other schools.
November 9: Social commentator and whistleblower Merit Wager revealed on her blog that administrators at the Immigration Service had all been ordered to "accept the claim that an applicant is a child, if he does not look as if he is over 40." A staggering 32,180 "unaccompanied refugee children" had arrived during 2015 by December 1 -- since then another 1,130 have come -- and the government finally decided to take action. If its proposition is approved by Parliament, everyone who looks adult-aged will be forced to go through a medical age-determination procedure. One of the reasons Sweden stopped doing these in the first place, was that pediatricians refused to take part in them. They said the procedures were "unreliable."
November 10: A 28-year-old Iraqi man was prosecuted for raping a woman on a night train between Finland and Sweden. The man had originally planned to seek asylum in Finland, but had found the living conditions there too harsh. He had therefore taken a train back to Sweden. In a couchette (sleeping car where men and women are together), the rapist and two other asylum seekers met one of the many Swedish women whose hearts go out to "new arrivals." The woman bought sandwiches for the men; they drank vodka. When two of the men started groping the woman, she told them to stop, yet chose to lie down and go to sleep. Sometime during the night, she was awakened by the Iraqi as he raped her. The woman managed to break free and locate a train attendant. To the attendant's surprise, the woman did not immediately want to press charges. The court documents state: "The train attendant asked if he should call the police. At first, the woman did not want him to do so, because she did not want to put N.N., an asylum seeker, in a tough spot. She felt sorry for him... and was afraid he would be deported back to Iraq."
The man was given a sentence of one year in prison, payment of 85,000 kronor (about $10,000) in damages, and deportation -- but will be allowed to come back to Sweden after five years.
November 10: An Algerian and a Syrian asylum seeker were indicted for raping a Swedish woman in Strängnäs. The men, 39-year-old from Algeria and 31-year-old from Syria, met the woman in a bar one night in August. When the woman left, one of the men followed her, pulled her to the ground, and assaulted her. Afterwards, the woman kept walking, and ran into two other men -- the Syrian and another unidentified man -- and was raped again. The Syrian reportedly also spit her in face and said, "I'm going to f--k you, little Swedish girl." The men, who lived at the same asylum house, denied knowing each other when questioned by the police. The verdict was announced on December 1. Rapist number one was sentenced to 2.5 years in prison, 117,000 kronor (about $14,000) in damages, and deportation to Algeria. Rapist number two was convicted of aggravated rape and sentenced to four years in prison. He cannot be deported, however, because "there are currently hindrances towards enforcing deportations to Syria." He was also ordered to pay the woman 167,000 kronor (about $20,000) in damages.
November 13: A trial began against eight Eritrean men, between the ages of 19 and 26, who according to the District Court, "crudely and ruthlessly" gang-raped a 45-year-old woman. She had been waiting in a stairwell for a friend when the men invited her into an apartment. Inside, she was thrown on the floor, held down, beaten and brutally raped. When questioned by the police, she said, "It felt as if there were hands and fingers everyplace. Fingers penetrated me, vaginally, anally. It hurt very much. I could feel the fingernails." She said she could also hear the Eritreans laughing and speaking in their own language while they raped her. "They seemed to be enjoying themselves," she said.
When two of the men started fighting over who should rape her next, she tried to flee, but one of the men hit her over the head; she fell unconscious. After coming to, she escaped out a window and was able to reach a neighbor.
The District Court of Falun established that several men had taken part in the attack, but the District Attorney was unable to prove who had done what. Therefore, only one man was convicted of aggravated rape, and sentenced to five years in prison. The others were sentenced to only 10 months in prison for helping to conceal a serious criminal offense. After serving their time, the men will be allowed to stay in Sweden.
November 14: The Swedish Security Service, Säpo, warned again of Muslim terrorists hiding among migrants. The number of individuals listed as potential security threats has tripled this year, and includes several hundred who may be ready to carry out "Paris-style" attacks. As the Immigration Service has a huge backlog in trying to register all 150,000 asylum seekers who have come to Sweden so far in 2015, there are probably also many migrants that would be considered potential security threats.
November 14: Sweden's Foreign Minister, Margot Wallström, made yet another strange statement with diplomatic consequences. The day after the Paris attacks, in an interview with Swedish Public Television, Wallström was asked, "How worried are you about the radicalization of young people in Sweden who choose to fight for ISIS?" Wallström replied:
"Yes, of course we have a reason to be worried not only here in Sweden but around the world, because there are so many who are being radicalized. Here again, you come back to situations like that in the Middle East, where not least the Palestinians see that there isn't any future for us [the Palestinians], we either have to accept a desperate situation or resort to violence."Two days later, the Swedish ambassador to Israel, Carl Magnus Nesser, was called to a meeting at the Israeli Foreign Ministry. Its spokesman, Emmanuel Nahshon, later told Reuters, "The Swedish Foreign Minister's statements are appallingly impudent... [She] demonstrates genuine hostility when she points to a connection of any kind between the terror attacks in Paris and the complex situation between Israel and the Palestinians."
In a formal statement, the Swedish Foreign Ministry denied that Margot Wallström's remark had connected the Paris attacks with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. A Swedish Conservative (Moderaterna) Member of Parliament, Hanif Bali, sarcastically tweeted that it seemed the Foreign Minister is suffering from an "obvious case of Israel-Tourette's."
November 18: The Authority for Civil Protection and Contingency Planning (MSB) warned that the asylum situation was not only "very strained," but that things keep getting worse -- and that in some parts of Sweden, the authorities can only function until the end of December. Meanwhile, the Immigration Service calculated that another 13,000 beds are needed in so-called evacuation accommodations. "The problem cannot be fully solved even if the Armed Forces help provide more housing or if the MSB could arrange more tent accommodations," the authority wrote.
The massive influx of asylum seekers has also led to native Swedes "being crowded out of the health care and social services systems," according to the MSB. "It [the MSB] is so busy handling unaccompanied children and asylum seekers, that there simply is not enough time to tend to the everyday functions, such as healthcare and social services," said Alexandra Nordlander, Chief of Operative Analysis at the MSB, to the daily tabloid, Aftonbladet.
November 19: A fire broke out at Lundsbrunn Spa, a few weeks after plans were announced to convert the historic building into the biggest asylum-seekers' home in Sweden. According to the police, the fire was not an arson, but started in a wood-pellet stove.
Many hotels and spas have transforming themselves into asylum-seekers' housing, in order to profit from lucrative deals offered by the Immigration Service. Lundsbrunn Spa, near a mineral spring, dates back to 1890; in 1817, a hospital was established on the grounds. The nearby village is home to fewer than 1,000 people, so when Lundsbrunn Spa decided to accept an offer from the Immigration Service, the village faced a doubling of its population. The owners of Lundsbrunn wrote on the Spa's website that they see the transformation from spa to asylum-seekers' home as a temporary measure.
November 20: Norwegian businessman Petter Stordalen, the billionaire owner of Nordic Choice Hotels, announced that the chain's many properties in Scandinavia and the Baltic states would no longer serve their guests sausage and bacon for breakfast. The breakfast buffet of the Nordic Choice's Clarion Hotel Post in Gothenburg was named earlier this year the best hotel breakfast in the world by the British newspaper, The Mirror. But apparently, this award did not matter. The cause for the hotel's decision was cited as "health reasons." The internet, however, was soon abuzz with speculation that the real reason was adaptation to Islamic dietary laws (halal). One week later, Stordalen backtracked. The reaction from hotel guests had been too strong. Many people vented their anger over the withheld bacon on Stordalen's Facebook page. Stordalen commented: "The guests have spoken. Comfort Hotels are bringing back bacon."
November 23: Hassan Mostafa Al-Mandlawi, 32, and Al Amin Sultan, 30, were indicted in the Gothenburg Municipal Court, suspected of having traveled to Syria in 2013 and murdering at least two people there. The charge was terrorist crimes, (alternatively crimes against international law) and murder. Chief Prosecutor Agnetha Hilding Qvarnström, of the National Unit for Security Cases, said: "The act [was] committed with the intent to harm the state of Syria and intimidate the people, thus the classification: terrorist crimes. The hard part is to clarify fully whether these men have been part of an armed group, and acted within the frames of the armed conflict, or not."
The accused men came to Sweden, one from Iraq and one from Syria, as children, but grew up in Sweden and are Swedish citizens. They traveled to Syria in 2013, and joined one of the many Islamist terror groups there. According to the prosecution, they murdered two captured workers in an industrial area of Aleppo by slitting their throats. The prosecutor wrote that, "Al-Mandlawi and Sultan have both expressed delight at the deeds."
During the trial, films of the executions were shown, but both men still denied having committed the crimes. Those present in court agreed that the films were among the most disturbing ever displayed in a Swedish court. First, they show a man having his throat slit, the blood gushing before he dies. Then, the other victim's head is severed from his body, and the killer holds up the severed head to loud cheers from the others. The court's chairman, Ralf G. Larsson, told the news agency, TT: "Every night when I have gone to bed, I have seen a head hanging in the air."
The verdict was announced December 14: Both men were convicted of terrorist crimes and sentenced to life in prison. The verdict will be appealed, the defense lawyers said.
Two Swedish citizens were convicted by a Gothenburg Court of joining
an Islamist terror group in Syria and murdering two captives. Video
evidence (left) showed one victim being beheaded. When
asked if she is worried about the radicalization of young people in
Sweden who choose to fight for ISIS, Sweden's Foreign Minister, Margot
Wallström (right), blamed Israel's treatment of Palestinians. |
November 27: One week after Sweden raised its terror alert level to the highest ever in the country (four on a five-point scale), the police raised another alarm -- saying their weapons are simply not good enough to prevent a potential terror attack. "We are sent out without adequate weapons, only a nine millimeter service pistol. We are also told that there may not be enough protective vests and ballistic helmets. It feels like being sent out on a lion hunt with a pea-shooter and a jumpsuit made out of zebra meat," wrote a police officer called "Christian," in an internal incident report reviewed by the news agency, Siren.
His colleague, "Niklas," wrote that he had to patrol, without a protective helmet, a location considered at risk of terror attacks, because none of the available helmets fit his head: "Without the right equipment, and with inadequate training in tactics and shooting, we still had to work as live targets without any kind of chance to defend ourselves or our [locations] against a potential attack."
The police say they want to be able to use more powerful weapons, such as the HK MP5, a submachine gun that is popular with law enforcement agencies around the world. Few, however, have had the required training for it. Also, the existing MP5s are kept at police stations -- not in patrol cars. Martin Lundin, of the Department of National Operations, conceded there was some merit to the criticism: "We will probably need more people who are able to handle that weapon in the future."
November 28: A large mob at an asylum house in Nora tried to break into a room where a woman had barricaded herself along with her son. Some 30 Muslim men apparently thought the woman was in violation of Islamic sharia law, by being in Sweden unaccompanied by a man. They thought that she should therefore be raped and her teenage son killed. Asylum house staff called the police, who averted the plan.
Exorcisms as Popular as Ever?
At Texas State University, I teach an honors course called “Demonology, Possession, and Exorcism.” It’s not a gut course. My students produce research papers on topics that range from the role of sleep paralysis in reports of demonic attacks to contemporary murder cases in which defendants have claimed supernatural forces compelled them to commit crimes.
In fact, talk of demons isn’t unusual in Texas. The first day of class, when we watched a clip of an alleged exorcism at an Austin Starbucks, many of my students said that they’d seen similar scenes in the towns where they’d grown up.
Either way, these parents aren’t a superstitious minority: a poll conducted in 2012 found that 57 percent of Americans believe in demonic possession. Nonetheless, demons (invisible, malevolent spirits) and exorcism (the techniques used to cast these spirits out of people, objects or places) are often thought of as relics of the past, beliefs and practices that are incompatible with modernity. It’s an assumption based in a sociological theory that dates back to the 19th century called the secularization narrative. Scholars such as Max Weber predicted that over time, science would inevitably supersede belief in “mysterious forces.”
But while the influence of institutionalized churches has waned, few sociologists today would claim that science is eliminating belief in the supernatural. In fact, in the 40 years since the blockbuster film The Exorcist premiered, belief in the demonic remains as popular as ever, with many churches scrambling to adapt.
Exorcism’s golden age
So why has exorcism made a comeback? It may be that belief in the demonic is cyclical.Historian of religion David Frankfurter notes that conspiracy theories involving evil entities like demons and witches tend to flare up when local religious communities are confronted with outside forces such as globalization and modernity.
Attributing misfortune and social change to hidden evil forces, Frankfurter suggests, is a natural human reaction; the demonic provides a context that can make sense of unfamiliar or complex problems.
While Europeans practiced exorcism during the Middle Ages, the “golden age” of demonic paranoia took place in the early modern period. In the 16th and 17th centuries, thousands were killed in witch hunts and there were spectacular cases of possession, including entire convents of nuns.
https://newrepublic.com/article/126607/exorcisms-popular-ever
2015 year in review: 29 trends and events that just reshaped history (and may end in collapse or civil war)
(NaturalNews) I've analyzed what I think are the 29 most important
trends and events from 2015 along with how I think they'll impact us all
in 2016 and beyond.
This analysis is now published as a series of six podcasts on HealthRangerReport.com. Here are the bullet points of the 29 (or so) points:
1) Massive uprising against the political establishment (Donald Trump rides the wave).
2) Backlash against GMOs accelerates: Chipotle goes non-GMO, Russia bans GMO agriculture, more foods getting labeled as non-GMO.
3)
Accelerating rejection of the mainstream media as leftist agendas are
no longer hidden from the public. More people turning off CNN and the
New York Times.
4) The rise of the alt media, including all the sites I've personally launched in the last year: GoodGopher.com, FETCH.news, AlternativeNews.com, TalkNetwork.com, Glitch.news, Bugout.news, Stupid.news, Natural.News and many more.
5) The rise of the intolerant crybullies on college campuses as well as the new Tolerati
class of intolerant leftists who condemn everyone else as bigots and
racists even though THEY are the ones who are bigoted and racist.
6)
Increasingly sharp divisions between political left and right; more
talk of Civil War and secession. Signs that it's all headed for a
serious clash and possibly bloodshed.
7) Increased awareness of
crisis actors and false flag shootings; Amazon bans book on Sandy Hook
to prevent the public from even thinking about the possibility that mass
shootings are often staged or accentuated with actors.
8) GOP merges with democrats to become the same sellout party of Big Government.
9) Government debt spending total blowout rockets the USA toward financial collapse. (Omnibus bill and $20 trillion in debt...)
10) ISIS terrorism comes to disarmed France, demonstrating the total idiocy of open borders and disarmed citizens.
11)
Fast-track trade (TPP) pushed through, destroying America's sovereignty
and putting globalist corporations in charge trade, intellectual
property and even labor.
12)Awareness of vaccine injuries accelerates as more families lose their children to deadly vaccines.
13) Public awakens to Big Pharma price gouging, thanks to Martin Shkreli and Turing Pharmaceuticals.
14)
EPA unleashes massive river pollution, then tries to silence parties
involved (while arming up with weapons and becoming a "militarized"
regulatory agency).
15) Massive cultural push for gay,
transgender themes invades all media programming, including Disney,
Netflix and Amazon Prime; Supreme Court legalizes gay marriage
nationwide.
16) Rise of government totalitarianism and the police
state, more citizens awaken to the fact that they are now living in a
police state. John W. Whitehead releases "Battlefield America."
17)
The collapse of America's educational institutions into indoctrination
centers that teach victimization rather than economics.
18)
Massive oil industry bankruptcies as Saudis attempt to destroy the
fracking and shale oil industries in North America. Watch for oil prices
to skyrocketed in the next 1-3 years, back to over $150 per barrel.
19)
Turning point on gun control as more Americans REJECT an assault
weapons ban in the name of self-defense. Obama's gun control push is
utterly failing to gain traction...
20) Escalation of war posturing between the U.S., China and Russia.
21)
ISIS invades America with the help of Obama, terrorism on U.S. soil;
Obama revealed as a sleeper cell trying to invade, occupy and destroy
America.
22) Obama gives Iran the nuke. Only a matter of time before Iran tries to nuke Israel and destabilize the Middle East.
23)
Police state medicine accelerates with California mandatory vaccine
push that now injects children with mercury in the form of flu shots
(California suspends ban on mercury in flu shots for children).
24)
Corporations ditch U.S. workers and push for massive worker immigration
to replace U.S. jobs with cheaper foreign workers. Thanks, Facebook and
Disney!
25) Doctor Oz survives malicious attack by GMO shills
who tried to destroy him for supporting GMO labeling on foods. Instead,
he exposes them as felons and fraudsters.
26) Statin drugs revealed as medical fraud; accelerates aging and nullifies immune response to vaccines.
27)
Wave of deaths among alternative medicine doctors raises questions of
assassination or malicious extermination of holistic doctors.
28)
"Lights Out" book by Ted Koppel - risk of EMP or cyber attack grid down
scenario goes mainstream; Ted Koppel exposes total government
incompetence and shocking lack of preparedness.
29) Record gun
sales as Americans arm up against oppressive government and attempted
gun confiscation. Patriotic Americans are literally arming themselves in
anticipation of a revolution or Civil War.
Japan Releases Fully “Functioning” Female Robots
Japan unveils their first prototype of a Female robot that seems to do it all. It can cook, clean, say nice things to you, and supposedly even jumps into the sack too if you can believe it. All for the astronomical price of just 345,000 dollars.Kendall Jenner’s Love Magazine Isis Queen: High Illuminati Ritual On Last Day Of Advent
